In September 1996, fifty-three-year-old heroin addict Billy Ochoa was sentenced to 326 years in prison. His crime: committing $2,100 worth of welfare fraud. Ochoa was sent to New Folsom supermax prison, joining thousands of other men who will spend the rest of their lives in California's teeming correctional facilities as a result of that state's tough Three Strikes law. His incarceration will cost over $20,000 a year until he dies. Hard Time Blues weaves together the story of the growth of the American prison system over the past quarter century primarily through the story of Ochoa, a career criminal who grew up in the barrios of post-World War II L.A. Ochoa, who had a long history of nonviolent crimes committed to fund his drug habit, and cycled in and out of prison since the late 1960s, is a perfect example of how perennial misfits, rather than blood-soaked violent criminals, make up the majority of America's prisoners.
This is also the story of the burgeoning careers of politicians such as former California governor Pete Wilson, who rose to power on the "crime issue." Wilson, whose grandfather was a cop murdered by drug-runners in early twentieth-century Chicago, scored a stunning come-from-behind re-election victory in 1994. In so doing, he came to epitomize the 1990s tough-on-crime politician.
